


Goodwill to All Vamps

by EllieRose101



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV)
Genre: Christmas, F/M, Season/Series 04
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-26 14:14:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17143262
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EllieRose101/pseuds/EllieRose101
Summary: This holiday season, Buffy is being extra nice to Spike. He can’t figure out for the unlife of him as to why, but he’s not complaining. Much.





	Goodwill to All Vamps

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bewildered](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bewildered/gifts).



> Written as a Secret Santa gift as part of the ‘Hidden Gems’ Holiday fic challenge, this story is set after Hush (which was aired in December). In canon, Doomed (which was aired in January) begins directly where that left off, but in this reality, Doomed does not exist. This is what happened over the holidays instead.

One Shot 

Unsettling, that’s what it was. Giles had asked Buffy to “mind” Spike – as if he were a bloody dog, of all things – and she just shrugged and asked what time she should pick him up. If Giles hadn’t looked as surprised as he was, Spike would have known for sure they were up to something. There was just no way in hell the Slayer would accept a round of vamp-sitting without at least a token protest.

Maybe the bint had gone mad.

“Can you hand me that box?”

Spike stared at her, unmoving.

“The box,” Buffy repeated, very slowly, pointing at it. “Could you pass it here?”

Spike tilted his head. “You’re expecting me to help you decorate your Christmas tree? Slave labor, is that what you had in mind?” She had _definitely_ gone mad.

Buffy rolled her eyes and stood up from where she had been securing the base of the tree to fetch the box herself. She pushed a string of lights into Spike’s hands. “If you’re going to stay here, you’re going to help. Untangle those.”

He looked down at them, then back at her. He’d put money on her taking the piss, but something about it didn’t ring quite right. “You’re serious about this, aren’t you?”

Buffy, who had her hands half-raised in front of her in a vain attempt to straighten the tree, stopped mid-movement and sighed. Lowering her hands to rest them on her hips, she turned to Spike and took a long, calming breath. Instead of threats, however, she said, “If you help, I’ll give you eggnog. As much as you can drink. How’s that?”

Bribery over violence? Now that was interesting. He could put the change of tack down to seasonal good cheer, but Spike was still sure there was more to it. Even so…

“How much eggnog we talkin’?”

Buffy smiled despite herself. “We have four cartons. Finish all those and I’ll get Mom to pick up some more from the store on her way home.”

Spike started untangling the lights. “You sure someone hasn’t put a curse on these? There’s no way they could be this mangled from sittin’ in a box for a year.”

“That’s what I always say,” said Buffy on a laugh.

It was nice to hear her laugh, but Spike tried not to think too much on that. He changed the subject. “Shouldn’t this be a family bonding activity – all festive cheer between mothers and children? Why’s Joyce working so late on Christmas eve anyway?”

He’d meant nothing by it beyond casual curiosity but regretted the question when the smile dropped from Buffy’s lips. She refocused herself on straightening the tree. “Mom’s been working a lot of extra shifts. The gallery has another big showing coming up.”

“Uh huh,” said Spike, his eyes narrowed. “Why do I get the feeling a certain Slayer is feeling guilty about that?”

Buffy looked up again suddenly, her face red. She opened her mouth to let loose a denial, Spike was pretty sure, but she stopped herself at the last second and looked down again. “Mom hasn’t said anything, but I think college is costing more than she expected.”

“Ah,” said Spike, surprised that she was honest with him. Not sure how else to respond, he asked why Giles had opted to spend the holidays on his own. “I would of thought Joyce would invite him here.”

He could have sworn Buffy’s blush deepened. “Yeah, uh, she did. It’s just, you know…”

Spike stopped fiddling with the lights and gave her a steady look. “It’s what?”

“It’s awkward,” Buffy admitted finally. “Because of the sex.”

One of the lights splintered between Spike’s fingers. “Come again, Slayer?”

Buffy’s eyes widened but he wasn’t sure if it was because of the tiny shards of glass he was pulling out of his hand or because of the destruction of the Christmas tat.

“I’ll heal,” he said, holding up his finger to show that the cut was already beginning to close over. “And I’ll vacuum up any bits I dropped. I think there’s a spare bulb in that box you’ve got. Tell me what you were saying about sex.”

Buffy stammered for a few seconds, handed Spike the replacement bulb, then said in a rush, “The sex that Giles and my mom had.”

Another bulb splintered.

“Spike!”

“Sorry,” he said, without thinking. He set the lights down for a minute. “You’re telling me your watcher and your mum…?” He trailed off to complete the question with a meaningful look.

“I know, I know,” said Buffy. “It’s totally icky. Don’t tell my mom I told you. And don’t tease Giles about it. Please!”

Spike gaped at her. “Tease him? I’ll bloody well string him up!”

“Whoa!” Buffy took a step back. “Where did the sudden anger come from?”

He turned his eyes on his hands, double checking there was no more glass in his wounds. “Joyce is a nice lady, init? Doesn’t deserve to be used.”

Again, Buffy struggled to reply. After a second she said, “It was a spell. I don’t think it was….” she cleared her throat. “I mean, I don’t really like to think about it at all but, from what little I know, there wasn’t… _using_.”

Spike frowned and Buffy decided it was time for the first of the eggnog breaks.

An awkward silence hung between them as she poured two glasses – a full one for Spike and only half for herself. Spike broke it by saying, “And you? You’re not patrolling tonight?”

She waved a hand. “Nah, I thought I’d take the night off. The graveyards couldn’t be too busy, right? There’s no funerals over Christmas.”

It was on the tip of his tongue to point out that, while the no funerals part was true, the holidays likely wouldn’t put a dampener on any demon activity other than fledgling vamps, which still left a lot in a town like Sunnydale. He closed his mouth, deciding to just let her have this one. She likely already knew she was bending the truth anyway, and maybe he liked the idea of her being a little naughty, even if it just meant her taking a break for one night a year.

When the silence between them got too much again, his overworking brain got the better of him. Because he just had to know.

“Why am I here?” he asked.

“Gee,” said Buffy, “I didn’t think you went in for all that meaning-of-life crap.”

Spike held her gaze, not letting her get away with brushing him off. “For Christmas. Why am I here for Christmas?”

“Giles asked me. You know that. You were there.”

Spike set down his glass. “Sure. But what’s the real reason?”

She shone innocent eyes on him. “Real reason? I don’t know what you mean.”

He crossed his arms and she groaned, deflating a little. “Fine, I’ll tell you. You’re so annoying, you know? You have to question everything. You couldn’t just let me be nice to you for like one night.”

He waited, still not saying anything.

Buffy took a deep breath. “I know who the commandos are.”

Spike’s eyebrows shot up. He took a step back from the kitchen island. “You what?”

“You know all the stuff with the demons taking our voices?”

He nodded.

“I ran into the army guys that night. They were out trying to kill the demons too. One of them was this guy I had been kinda thinking of seeing, maybe.”

She looked ashamed in saying it, though Spike didn’t really know why. Speechless as he was, he let her carry on.

“So this guy – Riley – I asked him about what he does to the demons he catches and he wouldn’t say anything at first, so I told him the Cliff Notes version of what we’d already figured out and he still didn’t fully admit to it, but I could tell that I was on the money.”

Spike’s jaw clenched. Suddenly, he knew where all this was going.

“You asked him about what happened to me specifically, init?”

Buffy gave her head a single, somber nod. “I didn’t use your name, but I told him I’d heard about a vampire claiming to have gotten away from his guys. Riley…” she swallowed, as if she had a bad taste in her mouth. “He didn’t just confirm what you told me that night, it was like he was proud of it.” She shuddered. “He laughed about the torture you went through.”

It took a lot of effort, but Spike pushed down the anger swelling all around him. The fury not just for what happened to him, and for the soldier boys’ evident feelings about it, but also for how easily Buffy could have fallen in with such maniacal bastards. And the only reason she had stopped to question their methods was because of what he’d admitted to her about the true horror of what he felt. What they did.

Spike had never meant to tell a living soul about what happened in those science experiments, but he and Buffy had been engaged, and she’d asked so earnestly. The way he had felt, he could have denied her nothing.

That grieved him maybe worst of all. Because bloody hell if that closeness hadn’t hurt. He’d been doing a damn good job of ignoring everything it ignited within him, but when she looked at him like she was now – like she actually cared…

He looked away, glad of the fact that he wasn’t holding any more glass. He could have smashed every last bit of it in the house.

“I’m sorry, Spike,” said Buffy ever so quietly. “I shouldn’t ever have teased you about it. Not before I got the full story.”

He shook his head and threw his shoulders back. “No worries.”

Buffy bit her lip, clearly not buying it but not willing to call him on his bravado either.

They finished decorating the tree in amiable silence, moving around each other like they’d been doing it for years.

Finally, the box was empty except for one final twig, hiding at the bottom. Spike twirled it between his fingers, just out of Buffy’s line of sight.

“This Riley,” he dared to ask. “What did you do about him?”

“I told him to never to talk to me again. Giles and Willow are looking into a way to get his operation shut down.”

Spike smiled, more than happy with the response. He decided to match her bravery with some of his own and held the mistletoe above his head. Buffy looked at it, then focused her eyes on his lips before wetting her own.

She leaned in.


End file.
